E-visa scheme to boost arrivals for Myanmar

A windfall of tourist arrivals is expected in Myanmar in 2015, the country’s Ministry of Immigration and Population predicts, a 67% increase from this year. The strong upward trend is being pushed by the launch of an e-visa scheme last month.

“The e-visa is a system that’s easy to use, so we expect more tourists will visit our country in this season as well as in 2015,” a ministry spokesperson said.

“Since the launch in September, we have issued e-visas to a thousand visitors already. The number of tourists using the e-visa system is growing rapidly day-by-day and arrivals mostly come from the US, the UK, Japan, Germany, France and Italy.”

Following the e-visa launch, Myanmar is looking to expand the scheme to more EU countries.

Htay Aung, minister of hotels and tourism, recently said that the country expects three million tourists by end-2014. From January to August, Myanmar received 607,870 arrivals through Yangon alone.

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